Brainstorming Before Speaking Tasks
Brian Cullen

Brainstorming is an activity used to generate ideas in small groups. The purpose is to generate as many ideas as possible within a specified time-period. These ideas are not evaluated until the end and a wide range of ideas is often produced. Each idea produced does not need to be usable. Instead, initial ideas can be be viewed as a starting point for more workable ideas. The principle of brainstorming is that you need lots of ideas to get good ideas.
Brainstorming has a wide range of applications. Since 1930, it has been used successfully in business for invention and innovation (VanGundy, 1981). In the language classroom, brainstorming is often used in teaching writing. Activities such as free-association and word-mapping are often included as part of the pre-writing or warm-up phase (Richards, 1990:112).
Is brainstorming useful in teaching conversation? In particular, is it a useful activity for warm-up in conversation classes? This paper will help answer this question. Section A shows how brainstorming can help our students to become better learners. Section B describes a research study on brainstorming in the conversation classroom. Section C gives some simple brainstorming techniques.
Section A : Brainstorming Encourages Better Learning
Some learners are more successful than others. In order to find out why, Rubin and Thompson (1984:114, Rubin 1975) studied the characteristics of good learners. Four of these characteristics are discussed below. These may explain why brainstorming is a useful tool in our classrooms.
Good Learners Organize Information About Language
Good learners try to organize their knowledge. As teachers, we can try to facilitate this organization by using suitable warm-up activities. A warm-up activity can remind our students of existing knowledge. At the same time, it can direct their minds towards ideas that they will meet in the main activity. In this way, it provides a link between new and existing knowledge.
However, each learner has a different store of existing knowledge organized in a unique way. A textbook or teacher presentation can never use this knowledge to its best potential. In many warm-up activities, the teacher and students can be frustrated because the organization of language in the warm-up activity is different from the organization in the learners` minds. This mismatch is a block to good learning. Brainstorming invites the learners to organize existing knowledge in their own minds. Many learners have a large passive vocabulary which does not translate directly into productive capabilities in the classroom. Brainstorming can help to activate this. It works to mobilize the resources of the student by creating a series of connecting ideas. This leads to an organization of language. The links which appear on paper created in word mapping are visible evidence of this organization. At this point the learners will be better oriented to the topic and better motivated to fill the gaps in their knowledge.
Good Learners Find Their Own Way and Take Charge of Their Own Learning
Students who do not take charge of their own learning are unable to take full advantage of learning opportunities. This is a problem that faces many Asian students who are generally more reserved than western students (Tsui , 1996). Many teachers find that lack of self-initiative is usually more of a problem than lack of ability in conversation classes.
Brainstorming can help learners to take charge. Learners begin examining their existing resources and identifying gaps in their knowledge. The free association nature allows learners to become involved in the selection of language used in the speaking task.
Good Learners Make Intelligent Guesses
The good learner makes intelligent guesses, but the language classroom often works against this. Because of nervousness in a foreign language or fear of teacher correction, many students are afraid of using language unless they are sure that it is totally correct (Lucus 1984). This stops them making intelligent guesses and slows down learning.
Brainstorming can help students to learn to take risks. McCoy (1976) makes a strong argument in favour of learning problem-solving skills in order to reduce anxiety. There are no `right` or `wrong` answers in brainstorming and no danger of teacher correction. By carrying out a simple brainstorming warm-up, students can obtain a sense of competence and feel more confident in making intelligent guesses.
Good Learners Use Contextual Cues to Help Them in Comprehension
The good learner uses the context of language to help in comprehension but the foreign language classroom can often seem artificial. Brainstorming allows the students to create a context for the subsequent speaking task. Relevant existing knowledge (content schema) can be called up from memory and can provide a context which supports comprehension and production in the subsequent speaking task.
As discussed in this section, brainstorming can help our students to become better learners, but equally importantly, students will benefit just by working in groups. They will learn language from each other and by interacting together they will become better communicators.
Section B : A Research Study on the Use of Brainstorming
A research study on the use of brainstorming was carried out in Oral Communication classes at a Japanese senior high school. The students had studied English since junior high school, but